"It shows two marchers, two children, a woman carrying a baby and a dog, which was the march mascot.

"They are all walking out of the ribs of a ship carrying a banner.

The "Spirit of Jarrow" was unveiled in the Viking Shopping Centre at 1100 BST, the time the original marchers set off for London from the Jarrow Town Hall.

The Jarrow Crusade caught the public attention

Vince Ray said: "The march is international now... we get students from all over the world asking about it, so there should be a resource centre for this by now.

"In those days there were hundreds of marches and none of them were as successful as the Jarrow march.

"It was well disciplined and they were very well received.

"The march was not party political, it was all persuasions letting the country know their plight, they were all skilled tradesmen who over 80 years had produced 80,000 ships for the British empire, but they had been unemployed for six years.

"At the time, a Daily Herald reporter marched with them and sold his reports to the world."